WKU student wins national photojournalism award

Classmate places second in multimedia

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. (June 6, 2016) — Western Kentucky University student Brittany Greeson has been named the national photojournalism champion in the 2016 Hearst Journalism Awards Program.

Greeson, a senior from Owensboro, won the championship and received a $5,000 award June 2 in San Francisco. She also received a $1,000 award for Best Portfolio.

Alyse Young, a senior from Redmond, Wash., finished second in the national multimedia championship and received a $4,000 award.

WKU students have won 15 Hearst individual national championships since 1985 — photojournalism in 1987, 1988, 1991, 1992, 1996, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2010, 2014 and 2016; multimedia in 2015; writing in 1985; and radio news in 2006.

Nick Wagner, a senior from Ada, Minn., also was among the six finalists in the national photojournalism championship and received a $1,500 award.

The national championships in photojournalism, multimedia, writing and broadcast news were held May 30 to June 2.

Often called “The Pulitzers of college journalism,” the Hearst program holds yearlong competitions in writing, photojournalism, broadcast news and multimedia for journalism undergraduates. Schools accumulating the most points earned by their students in each category are designated the winners of the Intercollegiate Competitions.

WKU’s School of Journalism & Broadcasting placed third overall in the 2015-16 Hearst program after winning the Intercollegiate Multimedia Competition and finishing second in the Intercollegiate Photojournalism Competition.

WKU has finished in the top five nationally in the Hearst overall competition for the past seven years and won the national championship in 2000, 2001 and 2005. WKU has won the multimedia competition for five consecutive years, has won the photojournalism competition 22 times in the past 27 years and has finished in the top eight overall for 23 straight years.